The Red Wings can look back at their first game and note they didn’t play well. They can reason that so long as they bear down, the second game should have a different result.

That worked against the Anaheim Ducks, anyway. It’s going to be a lot tougher to equalize the series against the Chicago Blackhawks.

The Wings opted to use today as a day of rest, something that was planned before Wednesday’s Game 1 at United Center left the Wings defeated, 4-1. Coach Mike Babcock said afterward he thought the score was fair, and that it reflected the tired legs the Wings had after all the travel of the Anaheim series. He also said that’s got to change, immediately.

“We’ll have a day off and then practice,” Babcock said. “We’ve got to get up to speed because we weren’t - we haven’t played like that in a while.”

Game 1 settled the question of whether it’s better to be well-rested, like the Blackhawks were, or well-tested, like the Wings were, after Round 1. The only reason the score didn’t mirror the 7-1 blowout the Blackhawks handed the Wings during the regular season was Jimmy Howard, who drew adjectives like “unbelievable” after making 17 saves just in the second period.

The Wings lost their opening game to the Ducks, too, in the last round, and then came back and won the next game, splitting the opening pair on the road like many visiting teams hope to do. Maybe the Wings will pull out a win Saturday in Game 2, but the Blackhawks aren’t as fragile as the Ducks. The Blackhawks didn’t show any frustration after their dominant second period didn’t dent a 1-1 score Wednesday. They just kept barraging Howard until they got another goal, and then they made it 3-1 and then it was over.

Even if the Wings are better on Saturday, will it be enough? Look at who scored for the Blackhawks in Game 1 — sure their first goal came on a power play from star forward Marian Hossa. But the second goal was from third-pair defenseman Johnny Oduya and the third goal was from fourth-liner Marcus Kruger. That left the Wings overwhelmed.

“They’re a deep team, and they’ve got four lines going,” Gustav Nyquist said. “We’ve got to match that work ethic their lines have.”

The Wings can look back at the past month and take strength from all the times they looked out only to end up being in. They were out of the playoffs entering the last week of the regular season, in at number seven by the end. They were on the verge of being ousted by the Ducks after Game 5, into round two after winning the last two games, including closing out Anaheim on the road.

Throughout the Ducks series, Babcock said that the longer it went, advantage, Detroit. Now with this Blackhawks series, which features two-day breaks between the first two games in Chicago and another two days after the series moves to Detroit, “we have no reason not to be very good in the next game,” Babcock said.

“We’ve got to get back at her and get playing at a high tempo, because obviously they were playing at a level that we weren’t playing at.”

The Blackhawks banished the Minnesota Wild in five games, ran roughshod over the team that last summer added one of hockey’s top game-changers in Zach Parise and prized free-agent defenseman Ryan Suter. The Blackhawks aren’t going to let up on Detroit, either. The Wings may play much better after the two-day break, but they’re still faced with taking on a team that attacks in wave after wave and faced with a defense that was so effective at moving the puck in Game 1 the Wings barely got near Corey Crawford, not until after Chicago had a two-goal lead and the urgency grew. For long stretches, the Wings were just schooled, standing around like spectators.

“We can’t do that,” Kronwall said. “Chicago is too good of a team for that. We have to make sure we play for 60 minutes. I know that might sound like I’m repeating things all over again, but it’s something we have to focus on.”

It worked against the Ducks. The Blackhawks will be harder to level, no matter how how desperate the Wings play.

Contact Helene St. James: 313-222-2295 or hstjames@freepress.com. Follow her on Twitter @helenestjames.